Back in the 80s, if you wanted good quality document printing you went to your local print shop.
Then Hewlett Packard developed the first affordable laser printers and everything changed. Prototyping could be about to experience a similarly game-changing proposition, and strangely enough it uses the same technology as the laser printer – only this time it’s not letters and spreadsheets it’s printing, but 3D objects, and it’s set to speed up development cycles substantially.
The 3D printer sounds like the stuff of science fiction, but the technology has actually been around for several years. The first 3D printers arrived in the 90s and every year they’ve got quicker and cheaper – a trend that will continue.
The new HP Designjet 3D Printer from Hewlett Packard costs just over £11,000 – the first LaserJet printer cost around £1,750 back in 1984 (that’s worth around £4,000 now). It’s about the same size as the first laser printer, and will produce 3D objects of up to 20x20x15cm in a few hours. Crucially, the device doesn’t need to be sat in the lab; it will sit happily on your desk. And just as laser printing moved from black and white to colour, the same thing has happened with 3D prototyping. The latest 3D printers will produce colour prototypes as well as black and white.
Believe us, 3D printing will change things. It’s already doing wonders for product design. But what really excites us is what will happen when the cost of the printer comes down to really affordable prices.
In 10 years’ time, instead of buying a product from a website and then waiting for the delivery, you’ll instead buy the 3D design, download the design, hit print and minutes later there’s the object.
If you want something a little bit more complicated you will have to wait a little longer and put it together yourself, or perhaps go to your local 3D corner shop, where your product will be created while you wait.